Freeing Our Brachiopod Brothers From Their Bedrock Confines

Our Brachiopod Brothers In Evolution
By: The Western Paleontology Immature Amateur Enthusiasts
Jenny Germano, Caroline Wagner, Kristin McCartney, Jason Ivaliotis

Introduction
We believe that we will not find a T-Rex skull nor Jimmy Hoffa nor mosquito DNA in
amber nor the last vestiges of the Disco Era in Brookville, Indiana. Well, maybe weíll find the last
vestiges of the Disco Era. We do believe that we will find a good deal of brachiopod fossils just
waiting for us on the side of the highway. These fossils will help us to answer the ever important
question ñ are we alone in the universe? Are brachiopods alien remains from Mars? We
hypothosize no, because we plan to show that they evolved here on the wonderful planet Earth.
All kidding aside, we hypothosize that the brachiopods will change through the different
formations. We will identify these brachiopods by their genuses, their variance in size, diversity of
genuses, the concentration of different populations, and by looking for trace fossils to identify the
different strata. All of these fossils should be within the Ordovician Period. The different
formations we hope to look find are Drakes, Whitewater, Liberty, Waynesville, or Arnheim. Then
we would like to examine the changes in the brachiopod fossils throughout a single formation.
Brachiopod evolution seemed like a great project for many reasons. Of course there is the
pure fun factor. There are many other very practical considerations: 1. This area has a unique and
abundant amount of fossils. 2. Fossils will not change in the course of our study. Famine, fire,
war, locusts or even an early frost will not effect our results. We can do our research at our
convenience. 3. Studying brachiopods made sense, because they are both numerous and
widespread throughout the local fossil formations. 4. Hays reminds us so much of that heroic
explorer, Indiana Jones, that we were inspired. 5. Though easily comprehended, our project
contains many words that are difficult to spell. So we look smart.

We hope to be able to trace the evolutionary process of brachiopods through and within
the different formations. We want to (correctly) identify different genuses of brachiopods. We
want to collect a lot of fascinating fossils, and inspire others to become interested both in fossil
collecting and the evolutionary process. Brightening Joe Marrickís boring day hidden in the
corner of the infrequently visited Limper Geology Museum with our ingenious selves is also a
goal.
Relevance Of Our Research
There has been little research into the evolution of brachiopods, even though our area
provides fertile opportunites for discovering more about these fascinating creatures. We hope
that by examining the relatively simple structures of brachiopods that we may gain a better
understanding of evolution in general. (The necessity of taking a road trip to do research did not
motivate us in any way whatsoever.)
We are building on the work done by Caster, Dalve and Pope. In the 1950ís they
catagorized the local Ordivician strata. Their work has served as a guide to fossil hunters and
researchers who work in the Cincinnati area. We will identify these brachiopods by their genuses,
their variance in size, diversity of genuses, the concentration of different populations, and by
looking for trace fossils to identify the different strata.

Materials and Methods
*Experimental Design: We are going to use Jasonís car to get to the rock formations in
Brookville on Sunday Ocober 3. The road cut exposes Ordovician bedrock that will serve as our
specimen gathering place. We plan to collect fossils from the roadside of Highway 1 in
Brookeville, Indiana. (We just found out this is illegal in Ohio. We only hope that if we are
arrested, our trusted leader Hayes will post bail for us.) We also plan to take pictures of the strata
formations and fossils. The pictures will later be developed and put on the web to be used as a
teaching aid for our discovery lab. On second thought, to be more specific, we will be taking our
film to Wal-Mart on Monday night and since we didnít meet the pick up time, we will have to
wait till Thursday night to pick it up.
When we bring the specimens back from Indiana, we plan on spending the next few weeks
trying to identify and categorize our fossils. First, we plan on trying to organize them by genus
using the books and guides provided to us by Hays and Mr. Merak. Then, we are going to take a
field trip with our fossils to the Limper Geology Museum to enlist the help of Mr. Merak on
further organizing and more specifically identifying our finds. We are guessing that this may take
awhile depending on how many brachiopods we bring back.
As far as our tools go, we will be using the ruler/calibrater thing, a hammer, magnifying
glasses, dentistry tools, camera, film, the world wide web, a couple gallons of gas, Jasonís car,
and some buckets.
We hope that through working on our own and with Mr. Merak we will be able to
develop a key to help identify the genus and species of brachiopods. By using this key and our
photographs, we are going to ask the class to help us identify some of our brachiopod finds as our
Discovery Lab. This observation of how the brachiopods differ will help to give the class an
understanding of the evolutionary process.

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Here is a list of responses that have been posted to this Study...

• God does not believe in evolution (10/1/99) [ Contributor: Pat Robertson-Section: jesus ]
• this is the most awesome project yet! (9/30/99) [ Contributor: Harrison Ford-Section: Zeus Cummins ]

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